When the Iron Bird Flies by Jianglin Li

Author:Jianglin Li
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Published: 2021-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

The Lhoka operation was a series of pouch battles of varying sizes. There was a “large pouch” formed by the east, west, and north lines, as well as “small pouches,” referring to rings of encirclement used to take out Chushi Gangdruk bit by bit. This was a common military tactic for the PLA, and the basic one used to suppress Tibetans. The large and small pouches in the Lhoka Campaign were almost complete failures, however. A key reason was that the commanding officers at different levels did not understand the actual situation of Chushi Gangdruk, and their conventional military thinking led them to exaggerate the number of rebel fighters. As a result, whenever they were ambushed, they imagined that it was by “units covering the flight of the main force” and therefore launched into blind pursuit, believing they could overtake and attack Chushi Gangdruk’s main force. But the fact was that the ambushes were carried out by small splinter detachments, or by Tibetan Army remnants fleeing from Lhasa, or by small groups of Ratuk Ngawang’s troops who had temporarily teamed up in flight. They ambushed the PLA troops whenever the opportunity arose and, given the PLA’s greater firepower, then immediately withdrew and continued their flight. This guerrilla spontaneity, with absolutely no pattern, managed to stymie Ding Sheng’s troops at every turn. This delayed and ultimately prevented the formation of the large pouch Ding had planned, while the small pouches assigned to the various units basically came to nothing.

By that time, Chushi Gangdruk’s main force, in any real sense, consisted of the 1,000 or so fighters led by Gonpo Tashi. That unit, returning to Lhoka from the Chamdo area, slipped into the large pouch that Ding Sheng had arranged, but the PLA’s two flanks were spread too far apart to close the pouch, while the other troops pursued Ratuk Ngawang’s scattered men willy-nilly within the large pouch. As a result, a PLA force of nearly 10,000, searching throughout Lhoka for the main force of Chushi Gangdruk, merely brushed shoulders with them. Added to this problem was Ding Sheng’s anxiousness to score a victory. After troops were rushed over from Gansu and Qinghai, the soldiers assigned to the main attack were sent to the plateau before they had had a chance to rest or become adapted to the environment. Exhausted and struggling to maintain morale, they constantly supplied inaccurate information to the upper levels, dropped out of the fighting, disobeyed orders to advance, or launched only perfunctory attacks.

Feedback from the various units led Ding Sheng to conclude that the main force of Chushi Gangdruk was fleeing toward Lhuntsé, and although this conclusion wasn’t completely accurate, it wasn’t far off. In fact, the main force led by Gonpo Tashi had already reached Lhuntsé by April 13.64

On the basis of Ding Sheng’s conclusions, a new pouch formation was planned, and Ding ordered his units to divide into five routes to surround Lhuntsé by dawn on April 18. Several days later, he learned that the

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.